All Forum Posts by: Richard Sherman

You want to check by state.  I ALWAYS do pet rent, depends on the property for how much, usually $25-30 per animal and people pay it like you would not believe...we already collect a deposit of at least 1 months rent so we are good there.  Put down vinyl plank in the whole unit at carpet replacement time and do inspections at least every 6 months.

I agree with @Steve DellaPelle .  However, the tenant is being an a$$.  If it were me (and the property is local to me) I would apologize, say that I did not realize he needed notice that the HVAC guy and I were both going to be there and that in the future I will be giving general notice per the lease of 24 hours and he should assume the contractor and I would be there and we would be doing it whenever it worked and not around his schedule.  Yes, that is going overboard a bit, but it is about boundaries and respect, you were not doing anything wrong, he is being a stickler and an a$$.

I literally agree with everything that @Patti Robertson said!  100%

We have land on a couple of our properties that could be built on, but so far I can buy cheaper than I can build...so I buy...at some point, it will change, until it does, going to keep on buying!

https://get.biggerpockets.com/forms/index/

Landlord forms.  You probably do not need them all and $99 is a good deal if your doing a bunch of rentals, but for 1 lease, I would probably just look for a lease template for NY, the one you have might work as well.  A written agreement where everyone understands what is expected (chores, food sharing if any, cleanliness etc) is important and most of that can be done with a simple roommate agreement.  Just be very clear and communicate...being unclear is being unkind as granny used to say!

@Abel Sanchez Make sure you ask questions as the process goes and look into the law there in CA.  Depending on how involved you want to be you might be able to do it in the future.  You will always need someone to serve them though.  If they do it, the Sheriffs are a great way to get things served as everyone takes that very seriously (there is a fee, check for civil process service on the county website.

Good luck, act fast and be firm!!

I would just tell them that you agreed to cover the item because they are such good renters so you are crediting that amount to next months rent then tell them what their new rent is for the coming month so they don't overpay again.  Never give back the money once you get it if you can at all help it!

We have one master LLC that owns several sub LLCs as the single member owner (which means these sub LLCs do not need a tax return). The master LLC is a partnership with myself and my wife. We specifically did this in order to get it to have its own tax return (when your rental income gets large enough it starts to make sense to not have it as a schedule on your personal return, so now we get a K1.

The master LLC pays joint expenses like umbrella insurance etc. Eash sub LLC pays all the property specific bills and we retain whatever capital account, property tax etc in there and leftover is moved to the master LLC, we then pull dividends/distributions from the master LLC as needed (we do not actually live off the money so it is somewhat sporadic, we usually use it to buy more properties, but on occasion will take some home . Each sub LLC might be one or several properties depending on the size, we try to keep no more than about 30 units in each, which in our market is about 3-3.5 million in value in each LLC).

Does that help at all?  Anything more specific you want to know?  Really it is no different than running any other business, income - expenses = profit      Profit-capital accounts= money I can blow on jetski...err...or in my case more properties...haha

There are ALWAYS deals out there.  I am in the greater Portland, OR market (mostly buy about 30-45 minutes south of the city) which is one of the hottest in the nation.  Get to the meet ups, talk to brokers, look for those mom and pop deals that have low rents and thus lower values.  I have bought more this year than ever before and in contract on probably the best deal I have ever done (20 unit building, built in 1989.)

@Jonathan Li 11 Units!  Awesome!  Now add a zero to that buddy!  Keep it up!  

Here is how we did it..

Years 1-2 - 0 to 8

Years  2-4 - 8 to 8

Years 4-6 - 8 to 12

Year 7 - 12 to 16

Year 8- 16 to 25

Year 9- 25 to 65 (still going this year, should close on another 20 before year end.)

This doesn't count 8 units in Memphis...haha, they count as like 2 of my Oregon units by value...so throw in some more there